


a more perfect world than the universe

by i_am_therefore_i_fight



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Droid romance, Having To Do With Droid Intellect and Emotions, Other, i really tried to get all the droid stuff right, please don't get on my back about it, taking liberties with canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-07
Updated: 2019-07-07
Packaged: 2020-06-23 21:41:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,072
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19709998
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/i_am_therefore_i_fight/pseuds/i_am_therefore_i_fight
Summary: Luke Skywalker's pretty good with droids, but he was wrong about one thing: R5 didn't have a bad motivator. Just a fragmented memory.





	a more perfect world than the universe

“Our memory is a more perfect world than the universe: it gives back life to those who no longer exist.”   
― Guy de Maupassant

* * *

It was a closely guarded secret that R2-D2 had never had his memory wiped - after all, if the Separatists knew that he was well aware of every garrison location and battle plan of the entire Republic Army, his memory banks would quickly become the most coveted piece of technology in the galaxy, even more so than droideka deflectors or magnetic bombards.

Those who were unaware of this peculiarity marveled at R2’s quickness, his uncanny instincts, his eerily human-like grasp of every situation. Among those who did knew, he was seen as the ultimate secret-keeper, a trusted confidant, both wise and wary. But none among them - not even Anakin Skywalker, known as “Steelbrain” among the Republic droids for his honorary place in the droid community - could appreciate the weight of the secrets etched into his storage drives.

Humans had coping mechanisms, chemical processes that softened painful images over time. Droids, designed to have their memory processors wiped clean periodically, had no such defenses. R2 remembered everything - every death, every defeat, from the rise of the Separatists to the terrible fall of the Republic into darkness - in crystal clear detail.

He remembered, too, every moment that he had ever spent with the droid called R4-P17, could count the milliseconds of being in her presence. He could catalogue every exchange they shared over years of being at war together - the clicks and whistles of conversation in Binary at first, then the much faster flash of data over mutually forged neural pathways, nearly rivaling the Jedi in telepathic ability.

He could replay, in high definition, the Pistoeka sabotage droids ripping off her dome as she screamed, leaving torn wires sparking among her exposed circuits. The image would often come to him in low-power states, vivid as it had been in life - buzz droids crawling all over General Kenobi’s ship, tearing off pieces of shielding, sharp arachnid legs slotting into openings between R4’s dome-topper and the body of her chassis - 

It wasn’t possible to pick and choose which memories to erase from a storage drive like his. He could go under for a full wipe, or he could suffer through the memories. And he knew what the Republic (and later, the Rebellion) needed. So he maintained his vast archive of war and terror, offering up blueprints and battle plans while keeping private the constant reel of agony and death.

* * *

R2 powered on to a loud, slow grinding sound and a shove from C-3PO.

“Artoo, wake up!” C-3PO whispered harshly. “We’ve stopped!”

Booting up his processors as quickly as possible, R2 shrank back as the bay doors began to open, letting in the paralyzing blaze of Tatooine’s three suns and a flood of Jawas who began immediately pawing and shoving at the many obsolete droids in the cargo hold of the sandcrawler.

“We’re doomed,” C-3PO said, in as close to a whimper as his voicebox could manage. “Do you think they’ll melt us down?”

R2 shushed him as the Jawas routed them both from the corner and began pushing them toward the bay doors. Rolling out into the sunlight gave him the strangest feeling - like the reel in his mind was being printed right in front of his photoreceptors. Clear as if his memory cache was brand new, he could picture young Anakin Skywalker running across the sand from Mos Espa, reaching up with both arms to be helped on board the ship they had taken from Naboo.

Humans had a phrase for the feeling - _déjà vu_ , he recalled from years of tailing Padmé’s well-read diplomatic entourage. Another intangible benefit of never having had his memory wiped.

The Jawas lined them up before a series of small huts and a couple of dusty local humans, who poked at them and looked them over. “We’ll take the red one,” said the larger human, indicating the R5 unit next to R2.

R2’s cooling system kicked into high gear, whirring nervously. Some hours ago, he and the R5 unit had conversed quietly in the dark of the cargo hold, and he had tried vehemently to convince R5 that he _must_ be sold and that the fate of the Galaxy depended on it. Although his reluctant mention of the Rebellion seemed to pique R5’s interest, R2 couldn’t be sure that he had entirely convinced the other unit of the importance of his mission.

His synapses crackled frantically as R5 rolled off after C-3PO and the smaller human, and he attempted to follow, but one of the Jawas blocked his path. Desperate, he cried out one last time, pleading with R5 to remember what he’d said.

R5 didn’t respond, but slowed infinitesimally - by such a small amount that organic eyes were unlikely to perceive it. A moment later, the red droid’s head plate popped off like a cork, smoke pouring from the opening.

“Uncle Owen!” called the young human, prodding the droid and then huffing impatiently. “This unit has a bad motivator, look!”

 _A bad motivator?_ R2 happened to know for a fact that there wasn’t a single problem with R5’s motivator. As the red unit was carted back past him by Jawas, R2 magnified his view closely - and noticed the lubricant leaking through one of R5’s photoreceptors, which appeared to have cracked from some internal force. It seemed that, somehow, all of R5’s lubricant had been redirected to place enormous pressure on the head plate, which had also, somehow, been loosened from its hinges.

R5 whistled softly at him as they passed one another. _I remembered, R2_ , the other unit was saying. _I remembered._

* * *

It was extraordinarily uncommon for any droid to go as long as R2 had without a memory wipe. Almost any other droid that hadn’t been scrapped since the Clone Wars had very likely been wiped, retooled, and repurposed - and perhaps even a few of the scrapped ones, as resources grew thin near the end of the war.

The R5 unit had definitely looked like something rescued from a scrap heap - in fact, the cone-shaped head didn’t even appear to be the original topper of the chassis. As a matter of fact, R5 had appeared fitted for a dome-shaped topper, which would be unusual for a unit past R3 series. Unique. Identifiable.

 _I remembered, R2_ , R5 had said, lubricant leaking from her self-sabotaged faceplate. _I remembered._

**Author's Note:**

> In case it wasn't clear - because by the time I finished writing this I could no longer figure out if it followed logically or not - the implication here is that R4 didn't really die, but rather had her memory wiped and was retooled into R5, the droid that Luke originally picked over R2 in A New Hope.
> 
> Originally posted at https://i-am-therefore-i-fight.tumblr.com/post/186092030808/if-youre-looking-for-i-requested-a-rarepair-fic.


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